


CPR

by Hipporiot



Series: A Matter Of Time [4]
Category: The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-10
Updated: 2018-01-10
Packaged: 2019-03-02 15:23:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,094
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13321026
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hipporiot/pseuds/Hipporiot
Summary: "Math." -Captain Cold





	CPR

**Author's Note:**

  * For [WeThree](https://archiveofourown.org/users/WeThree/gifts).



> A quick interim between works, due to my inability to write the upcoming chapters fast enough to not feel guilty about the long waits.
> 
> Don't forget to leave a comment of something you liked, if you want! It helps me keep writing <3

'The Fastest Man Alive', with the lanky put-upon shoulders of a Titan, and the bleeding heart of a saint, a hero right out of myth and Snart's favorite old penny-saver kiddy comics.

An annoyance, poor for both their health, but God, if he isn't tantalizing, fine entertainment. 

"Told you I could find you without help." Barry brags, impressive, if he wasn't practically puffing his chest out for a gold star.

They're standing at one of Central's busier canals near the waterfront, not necessarily the middle of nowhere, but he'll give Barry a few brownie points just for the fun of it.

"Sometimes I really wonder why you need a team," He muses, letting Barry grin devilishly before he lazily points his cold gun at Barry's red 'not-leather' thigh-highs and trails up slowly, "and then I remember that get-up." 

Barry scoffs, lips pursed before he looks back to him, squinting, "...You wonder about me?"

Barry, trying to shame _him_. Cute.

He hooks his cold gun over his shoulder, musing to the both of them, "How many PhDs does it take to dress the Flash?" He's betting ten or more cumulatively by now, but that's none of his business.

Barry sighs, squaring his shiny hips while planting his hands on them without a single comedic squeak, he'll have to get Lisa to score him some of that stuff next time she plays with her nerd-puppy, "Cold, just tell me where you're keeping your new Rogue trainees and we can call it a day." Barry suggests, too impatiently for Snart's liking.

"Who says I'm keeping them?" He asks with a good mannered shrug of his fluffy hood. Can't let Barry get out of the habit of assuming innocence until proven guilty. It's a useful get-of-jail free card.

"Multiple witnesses." Barry answers with a nod of his head, "And y'know, the law." he adds serenely, a smug yet fond smile spreading across what Snart can see of his face.

Just. _Sickening_.

He clicks his tongue as he shifts his weight, leaning against the river's icy guardrail, "Nothing I hate more than a straight man." Barry's mask does nothing to hide the way he resists an open-mouthed laugh at the double entendre. He still gets a hum of approval from Barry out of it, so he'll count it as success.

But as always, Barry has to get right back to business, the buzzkill, "This is the last warning, Cold - I don't have time for witty banter."

He could let Red continue with the pitch, probably something about getting him a deal that his Rogue trainees will be charged as hostages, not accessories. That the scared metas that don't want to go to prison, that like money and freedom, that chose him and his forged 'family' over getting charged for stupid powers they can't control, will understand. 

As if.

" _No time?_ Not even for me?" He asks, watching Barry's genuine warm-hearted concern turn to overdone exasperation, the poor naive kiddo, "Kids these days." He chastises. 

Barry sighs, and Snart can tell what's coming faster than Barry can pack away his tender little heart and pipe dreams. He reads him like the comic book he is, and he'd be a liar if he didn't feel disappointed that they couldn't get more chit-chat in.

But, he is a liar. 

All it takes is a slight flick, aiming ice from his hip to the road, in a flare of lightning and steam Barry's running start stumbles, slides, rolls, and shoots right past his crossed ankles, through the guard rail into the river with a deafening splash.

And then... silence.

No lightning, no thunder, no flashy return. Nothing. He waits, a second, two seconds- he's still waiting. 

Barry would never make him wait.

He's had many thoughts of the Flash, but one recurring thought bites through the rest, one he hoped no other villain would think, or dare use while he still breathes. Of all the things that speed can overcome-

Barry can't outrun drowning.

Snart drops his gun, shucks his parka and boots, and vaults the rail into the river. No use in hesitation. 

The ice water is a shock, but the kind that's a rush as he tamps his body's natural instinct to panic as he dives to the river's shallow, rocky bottom. 

Which explains the limp body drifting in the murk, Barry's skull bashed against the river floor at fifty miles per hour or more. 

Probably more, he reasons as he fishes him up to the surface, Barry does like to show off. It's a struggle to get both of them up onto the sidewalk, Barry deceptively lithe for how heavy he is, he must be eating bricks.

But now he has to do more than pull both their weight.

It's been years, but he remembers enough.

He rolls Barry onto his side, ice water gushing out of his swollen mouth and nose. No breathing, no heartbeat. He puts him on his back, curses Cisco Ramon for the collar button and praises him for the neck to abdomen zipper as he rips the lightning emblem to the side, land marking his hands on Barry's chest, quick, and deadly precise on the deathly still canvas.

He starts pumping, gets to 3 - takes a deep breath, holds Barry's cold nose closed and makes a tight seal, mouth over mouth. 

He breathes out steady, careful not to push the air right past his lungs into his stomach. if he's going to kill anyone it's not going to be because he didn't know how to breathe, especially not for Barry. 

He pulls back and bites back the thought process, focuses on pumping, and breathing, and pumping, and being lightheaded, and pumping again.

It's been over twenty seconds, and he's allowing himself to guess that Barry's ability to heal will give him a brain-damage pass for being unconscious this long, while relying on shitty 80's first-aid resuscitation.

And he knows at forty seconds he can't realistically keep this up, nor can Barry's chances be much better than any normal string-bean with a dent in his head.

60 seconds.

He's still not breathing.

Leonard Snart's not going to be the man that killed the Flash.

He keeps pumping.

Snart breathes out.

\----_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_----

Barry breathes in.

Shaking and chattering, sick to his stomach, desperate and as scared and confused as he spent his first month without his parents, the way he still wakes up some nights. 

But this is way more physical, gasping shallow, soggy, heavy breathes of chilly air. Trembling hands reaching out for something, anything - and he finds it. 

Warmth, soft and stable, tense under his tremmoring hands as he holds on for dear life.

He's hugging Snart, blinking back the water freezing in his lashes and the spots in his vision - he's holding Snart. His own unsteady arms wrapped under Snart's stiff shoulders.

He doesn't know what he's doing, or what will happen, but he thinks Snart's hugged people- well, Lisa before. Pulling her in to kiss her forehead after a close call, taking her by the chin and looking over her scrapes and pupil dilation with veiled affection and pride.

That seems right, but he can't be sure when it feels like the world is inside out. 

He doesn't know how time works right now, either, or anything really, but Snart still hasn't moved to shirk his weight or tense up, almost like this is unfamiliar territory, to be hugged by someone he hasn't raised, maybe even a first.

The thought makes him hold on even tighter, chests pressed together and Snart's arms at his sides, no escape attempts. He sighs against him, his heart finally taking full seconds between beats.

Barry's teeth still chatter, this time fully from the chill and not just his nerves, and at his own realization of the reality around him Snart leans out of his arms in a way that makes his waterlogged stomach ache, but then it floats around impossibly as he realizes that Snart's detachment from the one-sided hug is so he can drape his - dry, warm, very comfortable - parka over Barry's own shaking shoulders.

He curls into it, pulling it around his middle and taking a deep, dry breath as Snart strides away to pick up his gun, bringing his attention to a wide circle of bystanders watching, and also holding phones, that for the misfortune of Snart's reputation have access to cameras and internet that caught most if not all of the rescue.

Snart clears his throat, "Delete it, or you're all being personally snowed in. Permanently." Snart announces in the most casual yet commanding oppositional mix of tones Barry's ever been witness to, and as Snart demanded, there's a wave of rapid tapping and apologetic anxious murmurs as the whole rescue is erased. 

At least, for everyone but the two of them, and Barry can't stop trying to meet Snart's very avoidant gaze.

Which leaves Snart open to somehow hone in on the only person that hasn't just reset their entire phone by a sheer compelling glare, and threat of death. 

Snart strides over to the unlucky man, "Do you know of the Donner party?" He asks conversationally, and by the man's queasy gulp and sudden toss of his phone into the river, he does. "Smart man." Snart comments, taking a moment to give the smart man a charming grimace before turning back to the whole crowd, "Now scram."

And they do just as he so threateningly suggested, some even - meaning one phoneless man - with enough fervor to fall on the ice on his way off.

Barry attempts to stand, and somehow manages it amidst the icy sidewalk and slippery guardrail that feels pretty useless, after, well, a pretty crappy swim. Snart's made his way back to him, pretending to not be hovering for some good old fashioned gloating, and maybe just a little steadying if he's feeling flirty and merciful.

But, to Barry's surprise, Snart stays silent, adjusting his gun into it's holster and taking in the winter wonderland of a view. Oh, right, his parka.

He makes to take it off, but Snart just raises his less busy hand, "Keep it, I've got a whole closet full of 'em." Snart assures him with a shrug, and he can't help how happy that makes him, between how cozy it is and how many fibres he can get from it to match to his evidence folders, Snart's almost just made up for half this experience, "Bet it stinks like baby powder now, anyway." Snart comments as he laces up his boots. 

And the baby jokes never cease, though this time he's also managed to make it a double jab on his tight suit, so at least he's branching out.

Snart pushes off from the guardrail, seeming ready to take his leave, but he stops short with a finger to air, "One last thing..." Snart leans in very suddenly, hands reaching for the parka's pockets as he stands a conspiratorial foot away. He roots around the pockets over Barry's sensitive sides for a second before pulling out a switchblade - and by equal measures trust and disorientation, Barry stands still, irrationally calm as Snart flicks the blade open, throws open the side of his parka, and slashes it in one fluid motion.

And if Barry wasn't already surreally confused by Snart's closeness and actions, he's downright confounded - and kinda impressed - as Snart takes a passport, a lockpick set, at least a thousand dollars in cash, and what looks like a small explosive device out of the lining before zipping Barry into it with a lingering swipe over his chest, like he's cleaning off imaginary crumbs that would be a great excuse for feeling up what he almost lost the chance to ever linger over again.

"Not forgetting your gold bricks too?" He asks, not quite sure himself if it's a sincere question or a joke to keep him here long enough for the CCPD, and maybe another hand swipe because he's past lying to himself, at least, when it comes to Snart.

Snart clicks his tongue, sticking one hand in his pocket and the other on the handle of the cold gun, "Nah, I let Lisa take those." 

Of course.

"Snart-" He tries, but Snart's pulling back too quick.

He steps back to the road as a motorcycle engine roars closer, "Looks like you owe me, again." Snart says, which makes him scoff, and he'd do more, but Lisa pulls up behind him on their getaway ride, "I'll tell the 'trainees' the Flash says 'hi'."


End file.
